D. H. Lawrence Quotes

It is the old practice of despots to use a part of the people to keep the rest in order.

Those who keep the masses of men in subjection by exercising force and cruelty deprive them at once of two vital foods, liberty and obedience; for it is no longer within the power of such masses to accord their inner consent to the authority to which they are subjected. Those who encourage a state of things in which the hope of gain is the principle motive take away from men their obedience, for consent which is its essence is not something which can be sold.

If monarchy is corrupting - and it is - wait till you see what overt empire does to us.

Whatever crushes individuality is despotism, by whatever name it may be called and whether it professes to be enforcing the will of God or the injunctions of men.

The world will not accept dictatorship or domination.

The strength and power of despotism consists wholly in the fear of resistance.

This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector.

this monster, this Colossus of Despotism ... a deep laid scheme to enslave us.

Such is the terror--the crushing fear--which is inspired by one man over that multitude, which now submits to his decrees with a zeal, apparently as ardent, as it is certainly abject and submissive. There is not a complaint heard. The calm and dark waters of despotism are never disturbed by the slightest ripple. Not a breath of free thought or manly speech passes over them, but they lie dead and deep, into which every vestige of the people's liberty and freedom has sunk and disappeared.

When the people are sheep, the government is always a wolf.

Authority has always attracted the lowest elements in the human race. All through history mankind has been bullied by scum.

The protection of the masses has in all times been the pretense of tyranny - the plea of monarchy, of aristocracy, of special privilege of every kind. The slave owners justified slavery as protecting the slaves.

Fear must rule in a despotism.

Tyrants are but the spawn of Ignorance, Begotten by the slaves they trample on.

Absolute power turns its possessors not into a God but an anti-God. For God turned clay into men, while the absolute despot turns men into clay.

Whether it comes from a despotic sovereign or an elected president, from a murderous general or a beloved leader, I see power as an inhuman and hateful phenomen. To the same degree that I do not understand power, I do understand those who oppose power, who criticize power, who contest power, especially those who rebel against power imposed by brutality.

I have no reason to suppose that he, who would take away my Liberty, would not when he had me in his Power, take away everything else.

The doctrine of blind obedience and unqualified submission to any human power, whether civil or ecclesiastical, is the doctrine of despotism, and ought to have no place among Republicans and Christians.

Under the rule of a repressive whole, liberty can be made into a powerful instrument of domination.

If you think of yourselves as helpless and ineffectual, it is certain that you will create a despotic government to be your master. The wise despot, therefore, maintains among his subjects a popular sense that they are helpless and ineffectual.

Conquerors never, never conquer a nation to bring freedom. They brought control.

Red is a benevolent dictatorship.

The more complete the despotism, the more smoothly all things move on the surface.

All men would be tyrants if they could.

Every tyrant who has lived has believed in freedom for himself.